


Shattered

by Renie_Black



Series: Stay Still [1]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Angst, Gen, M/M, Sad, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-30
Updated: 2017-07-30
Packaged: 2018-12-08 19:29:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11653185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Renie_Black/pseuds/Renie_Black
Summary: The night Kent found Jack’s lifeless body sprawled out on the wet off-white tile floor, Kent broke a bottle of champagne and lost twenty-five dollars in a quarter slot machine at a dingy, smoke stained casino.





	Shattered

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own any of these characters! This story focuses on Kent and the night before the draft and the aftermath of a suicide attempt. Please read with caution.

_Tonight is gone_  
They tell you it's your time  
But I won't let them take you from me  
And I'll never get far from you __  
\--Stay Still, Blessthefall

____

The night Kent found Jack’s lifeless body sprawled out on the wet off-white tile floor, Kent broke a bottle of champagne and lost twenty-five dollars in a quarter slot machine at a dingy, smoke stained casino. 

He was all nerves and frenetic energy, unable to sit still and felt the constant need to move. He had been annoying Jack, with rapid speech and drumming fingers on any available surface, which happened to be Jack's arm at the time. When he wasn't touching Jack, his hands flew around his face, animatedly emphasizing whatever excited point about the future he was talking about. His body tingled with anticipation, legs kicked out and intermittently tangling with Jack’s, who shied away from his touch. Jack pulled his body in on himself, making himself smaller than Kent. 

Blue eyes chilly, he finally snapped a sharp, “Damn it, Kenny! Just go!”

Kent blanched for a moment, pushing himself up into a sitting position, uttering a quiet, “I’ll stop. I should st-”

Jack whipped around and snarled, “I’m fine. Go.”

And so Kent went to some casino that didn’t bother to check his ID and lost twenty-five dollars in a quarter slot machine that could care less about who he was and the momentous day he and Jack had tomorrow. He enjoyed the brief moment of anonymity that he had inadvertently been provided, a moment where there wasn't pressure to be the best. Kent bought a bottle of five dollar champagne from the greasy haired bartender and smiled beatifically, all white teeth and dimples. He felt lighter as he walked back to the hotel, black plastic bag crinkling against his leg, a sense of calm slowly reigning over him. His smile morphed to a grin as he thought about how he was going to share the bottle of shitty champagne with Jack once they were drafted. 

He slid his key card into the slot, the door flying open to complete darkness, save for the faint glow of light beneath the bathroom door. Suddenly, dread washed over him, as he cautiously moved into the room. He heard the water crash against the ceramic of the tub, and tension pooled in his stomach. The blinking red of the alarm clock alerted him that it was 1: 54 a.m. and unbiddenly he remembered his cousin solemnly reminding him that nothing good happens after one a.m.

He touched the knob of the bathroom door and called a tentative, “Zimms?” 

Heart pounding when he received no response, he shouldered the door opened, champagne bottle clacking against the door and thudding against his leg as he did so. Jack laid sprawled motionless on the floor, half propped on the tub, tiny pills scattered on the floor like small bombs waiting to explode. The champagne bottle shattered as it tumbled from his hand, the liquid seeping into the cracks of the floor and brushing against the fallen pills like a river against rocks. Kent scrambled to Jack, grasping one of his clammy limp arms in his hand. He pressed his ear to Jack’s chest, hoping to feel the familiar thud of Jack’s heart, but found none. Shakily he pressed his fingers to Jack’s neck like he had learned in a long ago first aid class while calling 9-1-1 with the other. 

Kent felt something weak and sluggish beneath his fingers and released a hiss of relief. He robotically provided his information to the operator and followed her directions, watching as Jack’s chest barely rose and fell, but feeling the smallest glimmer of hope with each shallow breath. He kept checking for a pulse, hardly keeping his panic at bay the few times his fingers lost the pulse, and he couldn't feel anything at all. His stomach roiled as the sickly sweet scent of the champagne reached him, and the soothing voice of the operator reassured him. Idly, he noticed that he didn’t feel restless anymore; no longer filled with an energy he couldn’t define. Now, he felt both empty and like a rubber band being overly stretched on the brink of snapping. 

Suddenly, he was gently pushed away aside by the emergency personnel, a friendly faced woman pulling him from the bathroom and sitting him on the bed, quietly asking questions, Kent couldn’t answer through the ringing in his ears, her voice muffled by the clamoring in his own brain. Suddenly cold, he couldn’t fight the tremors in his hands, and his whole body trembled as he watched them roll Jack onto a backboard. The woman placed a crinkly silver space blanket over his shoulders and a hand on his shoulder. Her lips moved, but Kent couldn’t focus long enough to hear the words. 

“-call?”

“Wha?” Kent stuttered, eyes unfocused and wild as he turned to face her.

“Is there someone we can call for you?”

Kent shook his head, because Bob and Alicia were the only ones he could rely on, and they were going to be busy tending to Jack. The woman’s lips thinned, and she stepped in front of him as they rolled Jack by on the gurney and guided Kent to the cab of the ambulance. The ride blurred past Kent’s eyes, and he couldn’t hear anything around him except the siren’s screams.

When they arrived at the hospital, Kent shuffled into the waiting room, awkwardly clutching the space blanket around his shoulders, as they rushed Jack into a curtained area. Doctors and nurses swarmed the gurney, monitors screeching at the doctors to save him. 

Bob and Alicia burst through the doors, blinded by their fear and panic and ran past Kent like he was a ghost. A nurse had caught them before they got too far, all placating gestures and soft melodic voices, that no one used on him. Alicia crumpled against Bob’s chest, a strangled cry falling from her lips. Hospital staff pushed past him in their rush to get to other patients. A nurse guided them to a different area, leaving Kent alone amidst the moving cacophonous backdrop of the hospital. He sunk to the ground and something shattered in him, and a hysterical laugh bubbled from his lips as he was reminded of the splintered champagne bottle. 

The night before the draft, Kent lost everything amidst a white-walled bathroom in a standard hotel room, where a shattered bottle of celebratory champagne stained off-white tiles against the dripping of a leaky shower head.


End file.
